Jack watched as Nina emerged from the bathroom, soaked, but this time in
clean water, dampening the thin white towel that barely covered the expanse
of flesh between her chest and the tops of her thighs. Her hair was
sticking up in little clusters, matte in some areas and shiny and pointed
in others, dripping tiny dots of clear water from the tips. She'd taken
longer than the previous night to shower, longer than him, the dirty water
from the golf course having seeped into every pore on her skin and the mud
having dried a little as they sprinted along to the motel.
He watched as she stood in front of the suitcase, she shook her head, twice, showering the worn carpet floor with dots of moisture and then unzipped the case, pushing aside clothing in favour of the thin cotton house coat they'd packed for themselves. She wrapped it around herself, outside the towel, and then rolled her shoulders, finally realising she was being watched.
"So what's the plan?" She asked, retrieving her hair brush from the bag and settling down on the floor, looping her legs up underneath her. She dragged the brush through her hair once before he answered her, distracted for a moment.
"Lie low, here, tonight and then get out of here tomorrow morning." He told her. He scratched the short hairs at the back of his head as he spoke, they were still damp from the shower.
Nina nodded, and they sat in silence for a few minutes before anyone spoke again. Nina finished with the hairbrush and pushed it onto the table, getting up and moving in a different direction.
She'd noticed the scabs on his knuckles. "Let me see your hand." She said as she took a seat in front of him on the bed. She reached out for his hand and held his palm against hers, rotating his hand, examining the clusters of dry blood around the bone ends that extended in long stripes up his fingers. "Did you wash it?" She asked him.
The first aid kit was open on the bed next to him. He'd probably been about to dress his hand when she'd emerged from the bathroom. She pulled the kit across to her, sliding it along the ruffles in the bedclothes to her hip, where she extracted an antiseptic wipe.
"In water," Jack replied. He leant forward to give her better access to his hand.
Nina dropped his hand to her lap, taking a moment to read the back of the wipe packet. "This is Iodine, it's gonna sting." She informed him, and then tore open the packet and shook out the creases on the saturated wrap.
Jack didn't have time to mention the small vial of hydrogen peroxide or that of rubbing alcohol before he bit his tongue as the soggy orange wipe made contact with his cut. He winced as she dabbed each knuckle in turn, refolding the napkin as it became dry in places. She eventually finished his fourth knuckle, over his little finger and screwed up the napkin, placing it in the lid of the first aid kit as she grabbed the gauze. She sneaked a glance up at his face, smirking as she encountered closed eyes.
Nina placed a piece of cotton wool between two of his worst fingers and wrapped the holey white film around him knuckles, taking the material all the wall round three times and then pulling two pieces of adhesive tape out of a dispenser securing the first piece around the bandage and placing the second piece on his nose.
Jack opened his eyes, having not realised he'd kept them closed for so long, his hand was still tingling, with a dull background ache in his hand from the earlier scrape and the beginning of a bruise. He gave Nina a few moments to enjoy his embarrassed look before he peeled the tape off of his nose.
"Sorry." She muttered, collecting the iodine cloth and the extra piece of tape in her hand. She shut the lid of the first aid kit and dropped the box in the bag, and then padded into the bathroom to leave the rubbish in the bin there.
Jack flexed his fingers, testing the limits of the bandage. He was only going to wear one for the night, and maybe tomorrow morning, until the skin had healed enough for him to take it off. He brought the hand to his foot, cupping the toes as he flexed them, in their turn, and grimaced, inwardly, as she looked around the room.
In the hotel room last night, he'd slept on the couch. It was a spacious room, and the couch was large, he'd slept quite comfortably, but he wasn't sure exactly where he would sleep here. The bed very loosely fit the term 'double' and the carpet on the floor was worn and hard. He wanted to sleep in the bed, but he wanted Nina to get some rest too.
Nina returned to the bed, she played with the hairs at the back of her head, squeezing a fistful and letting it go, dripping a little water down her wrist. "I'm exhausted." She confessed, slapping her face and pirouetting in the middle of the room.
"I suggest you get some rest." Jack said.
"Aren't you going to?"
"What?"
Nina explained herself. "The way you said it - as though you were planning on staying up all night..."
"No," Jack thought through their situation. It had been over an hour since they climbed out of the pool at the golf course. They'd ran down to the road and found this place, gotten a room and both had showers, not once had either of them seen a security guard's car, after the initial area around the Malero building. There was no reason to keep someone up on watch - besides he was a light sleeper. "I think we both need to get some rest..." Now how to broach the subject of where?
"The bed maybe small, but I don't tend to fidget so..."
"Yeah, I'll try and stay still." He had a tendency to move around in bed, too many nightmares. He wondered if it had disrupted her sleep last night, she hadn't mentioned it. He let out a soft snort of laughter and lifted the bedcovers around him.
Nina returned to the bathroom and pulled off her towel, hanging it over the edge of the bath tub and wrapping her gown around her again. She flicked off the light as she left the room and rounded the bed, pulling back the covers. She slid inside the bed, flinching, almost as though she'd been burnt, when her shoulder touched Jack's he moved away a little and she relaxed. This was stupid.
"You okay?" Jack asked her, as a hand snaked out of the bed covers to reached the light switch.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Nina replied, uncomfortably.
"Okay," he switched off the light and slid further under the covers, pulling them up around his chest. "Goodnight." He whispered in the darkness.
-24-
Nina opened her eyes slowly, blinking. The room was dark, there was some light far away, but her unfocused eyes took a while to make the source out. She stared vehemently at the curtain, this intruder in her sleep. She padded out of bed and dragged the curtain shut, stalking back to bed before she was fully awake.
The sudden dent in the bed rolled Jack over onto his back and his hands intruded into her personal space. Nina settled back onto Jack's hands, resting her back on them. She didn't realise there was another person in the bed until she rolled over onto her side, inadvertently crushing Jack's wrist and fastening his hand against her chest.
Between her rib cage and the bedsprings, Jack let out a loud, pained wail. "Aah!"
That, finally shocked Nina awake. "Oh God!" She sprung upright and rotated so she could see Jack over his shoulder. He sat up against the headboard and rotated his wrist, rubbing the bone and scratching around the porous tape that fastened the bandage. "You okay?" She finally asked, as Jack's movements across his hand slowed.
Nina took his injured hand and smoothed her fingers around his wrist bone until she began to feel awkward. She searched for something more purposeful. She peeled the tape off the edge of the bandage, and then removed the gauze. His knuckles were covered in a thin layer of clotted blood, but new skin was probably already forming underneath.
Nina racked her brains to think of something to say to him. She didn't raise her head until she knew what to say. "Sorry I woke you." It was a feeble start, but it was conversation that wasn't directly related to touching him.
Jack's injured hand hit the covers like it had burnt her. "Do you know what the time is?" He replied.
Nina looked over at the counter, there wasn't a clock, but Jack's wristwatch was on the bedside table, the bedside table on her side of the bed, and she reached over, sliding it to the edge of the table with an index finger. She collected the cold silver and dropped it next to her on the bed. "It's nearly ten." She admitted, annoyed that they'd awoken so late.
She raised a hand to her face, rubbing at the corner of her eyes and removing the sleep from the creased skin. Her head dropped as she did so, and she noticed the wide parting in her gown, it lay open from her neck to her navel, held secure by the flimsy sash. Nina forgot her eyes and quickly wrapped the cloth around her, she hadn't put on a bra before bed, and Jack had been given a few inches of skin down her torso.
Jack pretended not to notice as she closed her dressing gown, Nina didn't glance up for a few seconds, and it gave him a few seconds to correct his expression, which ever one appeared on his face, taking a choice out of disappointment, embarrassment, arousal, curiosity, an endless choice of emotions.
"We must have been exhausted last night." He commented, pushing the covers aside and sitting upright off to the side of the bed. He considered getting dressed and going back to the hotel, he considered the possibility that only one of them went, and brought the car here.
"Yeah." Agreed Nina, shifting around on the bed so she could lean back against the headboard. She'd had a very sudden awakening and relished the comfort of the sheets and soft pillow. She collected Jack's watch and held it in her hand. She was rubbing the watch face with her finger tips, only vaguely worried about smears across the lenses.
Jack glanced over at Nina, she seemed preoccupied. "Hey." He caught her attention. "You okay?" He asked when she finally directed her attention at him.
"Yeah, yeah." She shuffled against the headboard, making sure to keep the front of her gown closed. She settled back into the same confused posture.
Jack placed a hand on the bedclothes near her thigh. "Hey." He said again, distracting her from her reverie and hoping she'd notice herself and confess.
Nina jolted again, and let out a withering sigh before she spoke. "I just..." She leant towards him as she searched for the words. "...why am I here, Jack? I'm not a field agent - I write papers, fill in forms.."
"You can do this, Nina." He told her, standing up. He placed his hands on his hips even though it was hard to look authoritarian with his shirt off.
She wasn't convinced, she edged closer to him, carving paths in the bed sheet with her nails. "Last night, I had no idea what I was doing, I couldn't input the numbers fast enough, I don't know _what_ I did with the codes."
"Nina." He pleaded with her to stop. Truth was, that she wasn't a qualified field agent, and in this arena, she could cost them their lives.
"Jack..."
"Nina, last night - you knocked out a security camera, you inputted God- knows how many codes into God-knows how many doors, you got us the data, you..."
"I wasn't able to disable the alarm, I don't even know how we triggered it."
Jack sat back down on the bed and grasped her wrist. He was sure her nails were about to cut into the sheet. "Nina, you're a good agent. You can do this." She refused to look at him, so he reached out for her chin, turning it towards him. He realised how sudden his movement was and let his hand drop to her shoulder curling the fingers around her shoulder, he was surprised that his finger found a perfectly shaped enclave in her shoulder blade. "I need you in this, don't bail on me now."
She shut her eyes. "I'm not going to bail on you." Nina let out a whimpering sound, not of her own volition. "But Jack, I don't know if I can do this."
"I need you in this, Nina." He muttered to her again, he let go of her wrist and slid a hand onto her knee, stroking the knee cap with her thumb. She opened her eyes and gave him a soft smile, she used her own hands to brush her hair away from her face and tried to smile again.
"Thank god you had this now rather than last night." Jack commented. Again a smile from Nina, a much easier one this time. She dropped one of her hands to wrap around his forearm, where he held her shoulder blade. "I need you in this." He reiterated, the words holding as much meaning this time as they did the first.
They sat in silence, watching each other, relishing the chemistry, the closeness, the sensations of the moment, before it began to feel awkward, neither one of them willing to take the chance.
Jack coughed, effectively ending their silence and let go of Nina's hand. "I was thinking I'd get dressed and go back and get the car myself."
"Why by yourself?" Nina queried.
"It'd be easier than carrying that bag up the road, and it wouldn't look as conspicuous." Nina nodded in agreement. "I'm going to get dressed."
Jack let himself slide off the bed and wandered over to the suitcase, pulling out a pair of trousers and a clean shirt, completely ruffled and creased all over. He shook it out, examining the damage before he took it into the bathroom, glancing quickly at Nina, seated on the bed, one leg stretched out in front of her, watching the toes on her feet as she curled and wiggled them.
He shut the bathroom door behind him, taking a quick stock of the small bathroom. Black clothing hung from the shower rail and over the edge of the bathtub, the trousers and shirts covered in crusted mud, the underwear much cleaner. He wondered if Nina had done as he did, standing under the shower in his underwear for a second, and then removing it and scrubbing it with liquid soap. He tried to ignore the visual, pleasant or otherwise, of Nina standing under the shower, soaking, removing her clothing. She rolled her shoulder blades. He wondered what her bare skin would look like when she did that.
Jack had to physically shake his head to get his mind back on track. He placed his trousers and shirt in the corner of the sink and used the loo, and then pulled his clothing on as quickly as he could. Jack pushed open the door to the bathroom and was greeted by the sight of Nina standing in the bedroom, pulling a shirt over her head, he didn't take in much of her apparel, just noting the top disappearing over the bottom of her breasts and the expanse of thigh, concealed from his view by only a tiny strip of green material. He shielded his eyes and quickly shut the bathroom door again.
Nina pulled the vest the rest of the way down her body and grabbed the gown she'd only just taken off. She put it back on, tying the sash around her waist, covering her modesty. She grabbed the door and pulled it open, revealing Jack standing there, with his hands on his hips.
"Sorry, I..."
Nina wasn't particularly bothered by him walking in on her, she was just desperate to get underway, back to their hotel. Jack broke off his apology as quickly as he started it, pushing past her into the main room. He started towards the bag.
"I'll pack everything up in here, you head back to the hotel, I've still got to dress." Nina watched as he surveyed the room. Eventually he gripped the door handle.
"I'll leave you with everything but the car keys, pay the bill, I'll probably get back in a half hour." Jack told her, she nodded slowly as she rummaged through the few items they had on the table, eventually tossing him the car keys. He caught them, and pulled open the door, heading out for his twenty minute walk up the road in the sun.
-24-
Nina fought off the urge to collapse on the bed when they finally got up to the hotel room. All she wanted to do was to lie face down on the large plush duvet cover, spread eagle and sleep for another five hours. She wasn't even tired, she just wanted the comfort. Jack dropped the sport bag on the chair by the door and she carried the hard drive to the bed.
She settled for perching on the end of the bed and unwrapping the hard drive. She placed it on the centre of the king sized bed, rolling the plastic bag up in her fingers. Jack came over, collecting his lap top from the bedside table. The laptop was almost completely empty, it only contained basic running software and few basic files, the registration codes on the programs had been stripped, removing any chance of tracing any of the software back to CTU. Jack inserted a yellow floppy disk into the machine and started it up, letting the computer know that any of the usual logs had to be recorded onto the floppy. Nina opened up the back of the computer, unraveling a short length of cord and fixing it into the back of the hard drive. The computer whirred into action after a short silence, and Jack was able to announce to Nina. "All the information is here, but the files are still encrypted."
"The Dramhurst key." Nina muttered. Jack exited the file manager and shut down the computer, disconnecting the hard drive, and removing the floppy disk. From now on the computer could not be run without the floppy disk.
"Which we know Carlos Batilla can lead us to." Jack muttered. This was the part of the plan that neither of them liked. Carlos Batilla was a Spanish military officer, a General. His name had been decoded in reference with several Basque separist groups, ETA among them, but nobody could prove he was dirty to the extent that the Spanish Military court requested them to.
Nina nodded. "We going to start tonight?" She asked, having let out a short sigh.
Jack glanced up at her, taking in the brief withering look that flitted across her face. "We'd better." He responded. He watched her stand up and walk a short circle, she tapped her thighs and closed her eyes. "We don't have to, if you're feeling..."
"No, no." She responded, "It's okay, we start tonight." She wandered off, and Jack heard the bathroom door click shut.
-24-
He watched as she stood in front of the suitcase, she shook her head, twice, showering the worn carpet floor with dots of moisture and then unzipped the case, pushing aside clothing in favour of the thin cotton house coat they'd packed for themselves. She wrapped it around herself, outside the towel, and then rolled her shoulders, finally realising she was being watched.
"So what's the plan?" She asked, retrieving her hair brush from the bag and settling down on the floor, looping her legs up underneath her. She dragged the brush through her hair once before he answered her, distracted for a moment.
"Lie low, here, tonight and then get out of here tomorrow morning." He told her. He scratched the short hairs at the back of his head as he spoke, they were still damp from the shower.
Nina nodded, and they sat in silence for a few minutes before anyone spoke again. Nina finished with the hairbrush and pushed it onto the table, getting up and moving in a different direction.
She'd noticed the scabs on his knuckles. "Let me see your hand." She said as she took a seat in front of him on the bed. She reached out for his hand and held his palm against hers, rotating his hand, examining the clusters of dry blood around the bone ends that extended in long stripes up his fingers. "Did you wash it?" She asked him.
The first aid kit was open on the bed next to him. He'd probably been about to dress his hand when she'd emerged from the bathroom. She pulled the kit across to her, sliding it along the ruffles in the bedclothes to her hip, where she extracted an antiseptic wipe.
"In water," Jack replied. He leant forward to give her better access to his hand.
Nina dropped his hand to her lap, taking a moment to read the back of the wipe packet. "This is Iodine, it's gonna sting." She informed him, and then tore open the packet and shook out the creases on the saturated wrap.
Jack didn't have time to mention the small vial of hydrogen peroxide or that of rubbing alcohol before he bit his tongue as the soggy orange wipe made contact with his cut. He winced as she dabbed each knuckle in turn, refolding the napkin as it became dry in places. She eventually finished his fourth knuckle, over his little finger and screwed up the napkin, placing it in the lid of the first aid kit as she grabbed the gauze. She sneaked a glance up at his face, smirking as she encountered closed eyes.
Nina placed a piece of cotton wool between two of his worst fingers and wrapped the holey white film around him knuckles, taking the material all the wall round three times and then pulling two pieces of adhesive tape out of a dispenser securing the first piece around the bandage and placing the second piece on his nose.
Jack opened his eyes, having not realised he'd kept them closed for so long, his hand was still tingling, with a dull background ache in his hand from the earlier scrape and the beginning of a bruise. He gave Nina a few moments to enjoy his embarrassed look before he peeled the tape off of his nose.
"Sorry." She muttered, collecting the iodine cloth and the extra piece of tape in her hand. She shut the lid of the first aid kit and dropped the box in the bag, and then padded into the bathroom to leave the rubbish in the bin there.
Jack flexed his fingers, testing the limits of the bandage. He was only going to wear one for the night, and maybe tomorrow morning, until the skin had healed enough for him to take it off. He brought the hand to his foot, cupping the toes as he flexed them, in their turn, and grimaced, inwardly, as she looked around the room.
In the hotel room last night, he'd slept on the couch. It was a spacious room, and the couch was large, he'd slept quite comfortably, but he wasn't sure exactly where he would sleep here. The bed very loosely fit the term 'double' and the carpet on the floor was worn and hard. He wanted to sleep in the bed, but he wanted Nina to get some rest too.
Nina returned to the bed, she played with the hairs at the back of her head, squeezing a fistful and letting it go, dripping a little water down her wrist. "I'm exhausted." She confessed, slapping her face and pirouetting in the middle of the room.
"I suggest you get some rest." Jack said.
"Aren't you going to?"
"What?"
Nina explained herself. "The way you said it - as though you were planning on staying up all night..."
"No," Jack thought through their situation. It had been over an hour since they climbed out of the pool at the golf course. They'd ran down to the road and found this place, gotten a room and both had showers, not once had either of them seen a security guard's car, after the initial area around the Malero building. There was no reason to keep someone up on watch - besides he was a light sleeper. "I think we both need to get some rest..." Now how to broach the subject of where?
"The bed maybe small, but I don't tend to fidget so..."
"Yeah, I'll try and stay still." He had a tendency to move around in bed, too many nightmares. He wondered if it had disrupted her sleep last night, she hadn't mentioned it. He let out a soft snort of laughter and lifted the bedcovers around him.
Nina returned to the bathroom and pulled off her towel, hanging it over the edge of the bath tub and wrapping her gown around her again. She flicked off the light as she left the room and rounded the bed, pulling back the covers. She slid inside the bed, flinching, almost as though she'd been burnt, when her shoulder touched Jack's he moved away a little and she relaxed. This was stupid.
"You okay?" Jack asked her, as a hand snaked out of the bed covers to reached the light switch.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Nina replied, uncomfortably.
"Okay," he switched off the light and slid further under the covers, pulling them up around his chest. "Goodnight." He whispered in the darkness.
-24-
Nina opened her eyes slowly, blinking. The room was dark, there was some light far away, but her unfocused eyes took a while to make the source out. She stared vehemently at the curtain, this intruder in her sleep. She padded out of bed and dragged the curtain shut, stalking back to bed before she was fully awake.
The sudden dent in the bed rolled Jack over onto his back and his hands intruded into her personal space. Nina settled back onto Jack's hands, resting her back on them. She didn't realise there was another person in the bed until she rolled over onto her side, inadvertently crushing Jack's wrist and fastening his hand against her chest.
Between her rib cage and the bedsprings, Jack let out a loud, pained wail. "Aah!"
That, finally shocked Nina awake. "Oh God!" She sprung upright and rotated so she could see Jack over his shoulder. He sat up against the headboard and rotated his wrist, rubbing the bone and scratching around the porous tape that fastened the bandage. "You okay?" She finally asked, as Jack's movements across his hand slowed.
Nina took his injured hand and smoothed her fingers around his wrist bone until she began to feel awkward. She searched for something more purposeful. She peeled the tape off the edge of the bandage, and then removed the gauze. His knuckles were covered in a thin layer of clotted blood, but new skin was probably already forming underneath.
Nina racked her brains to think of something to say to him. She didn't raise her head until she knew what to say. "Sorry I woke you." It was a feeble start, but it was conversation that wasn't directly related to touching him.
Jack's injured hand hit the covers like it had burnt her. "Do you know what the time is?" He replied.
Nina looked over at the counter, there wasn't a clock, but Jack's wristwatch was on the bedside table, the bedside table on her side of the bed, and she reached over, sliding it to the edge of the table with an index finger. She collected the cold silver and dropped it next to her on the bed. "It's nearly ten." She admitted, annoyed that they'd awoken so late.
She raised a hand to her face, rubbing at the corner of her eyes and removing the sleep from the creased skin. Her head dropped as she did so, and she noticed the wide parting in her gown, it lay open from her neck to her navel, held secure by the flimsy sash. Nina forgot her eyes and quickly wrapped the cloth around her, she hadn't put on a bra before bed, and Jack had been given a few inches of skin down her torso.
Jack pretended not to notice as she closed her dressing gown, Nina didn't glance up for a few seconds, and it gave him a few seconds to correct his expression, which ever one appeared on his face, taking a choice out of disappointment, embarrassment, arousal, curiosity, an endless choice of emotions.
"We must have been exhausted last night." He commented, pushing the covers aside and sitting upright off to the side of the bed. He considered getting dressed and going back to the hotel, he considered the possibility that only one of them went, and brought the car here.
"Yeah." Agreed Nina, shifting around on the bed so she could lean back against the headboard. She'd had a very sudden awakening and relished the comfort of the sheets and soft pillow. She collected Jack's watch and held it in her hand. She was rubbing the watch face with her finger tips, only vaguely worried about smears across the lenses.
Jack glanced over at Nina, she seemed preoccupied. "Hey." He caught her attention. "You okay?" He asked when she finally directed her attention at him.
"Yeah, yeah." She shuffled against the headboard, making sure to keep the front of her gown closed. She settled back into the same confused posture.
Jack placed a hand on the bedclothes near her thigh. "Hey." He said again, distracting her from her reverie and hoping she'd notice herself and confess.
Nina jolted again, and let out a withering sigh before she spoke. "I just..." She leant towards him as she searched for the words. "...why am I here, Jack? I'm not a field agent - I write papers, fill in forms.."
"You can do this, Nina." He told her, standing up. He placed his hands on his hips even though it was hard to look authoritarian with his shirt off.
She wasn't convinced, she edged closer to him, carving paths in the bed sheet with her nails. "Last night, I had no idea what I was doing, I couldn't input the numbers fast enough, I don't know _what_ I did with the codes."
"Nina." He pleaded with her to stop. Truth was, that she wasn't a qualified field agent, and in this arena, she could cost them their lives.
"Jack..."
"Nina, last night - you knocked out a security camera, you inputted God- knows how many codes into God-knows how many doors, you got us the data, you..."
"I wasn't able to disable the alarm, I don't even know how we triggered it."
Jack sat back down on the bed and grasped her wrist. He was sure her nails were about to cut into the sheet. "Nina, you're a good agent. You can do this." She refused to look at him, so he reached out for her chin, turning it towards him. He realised how sudden his movement was and let his hand drop to her shoulder curling the fingers around her shoulder, he was surprised that his finger found a perfectly shaped enclave in her shoulder blade. "I need you in this, don't bail on me now."
She shut her eyes. "I'm not going to bail on you." Nina let out a whimpering sound, not of her own volition. "But Jack, I don't know if I can do this."
"I need you in this, Nina." He muttered to her again, he let go of her wrist and slid a hand onto her knee, stroking the knee cap with her thumb. She opened her eyes and gave him a soft smile, she used her own hands to brush her hair away from her face and tried to smile again.
"Thank god you had this now rather than last night." Jack commented. Again a smile from Nina, a much easier one this time. She dropped one of her hands to wrap around his forearm, where he held her shoulder blade. "I need you in this." He reiterated, the words holding as much meaning this time as they did the first.
They sat in silence, watching each other, relishing the chemistry, the closeness, the sensations of the moment, before it began to feel awkward, neither one of them willing to take the chance.
Jack coughed, effectively ending their silence and let go of Nina's hand. "I was thinking I'd get dressed and go back and get the car myself."
"Why by yourself?" Nina queried.
"It'd be easier than carrying that bag up the road, and it wouldn't look as conspicuous." Nina nodded in agreement. "I'm going to get dressed."
Jack let himself slide off the bed and wandered over to the suitcase, pulling out a pair of trousers and a clean shirt, completely ruffled and creased all over. He shook it out, examining the damage before he took it into the bathroom, glancing quickly at Nina, seated on the bed, one leg stretched out in front of her, watching the toes on her feet as she curled and wiggled them.
He shut the bathroom door behind him, taking a quick stock of the small bathroom. Black clothing hung from the shower rail and over the edge of the bathtub, the trousers and shirts covered in crusted mud, the underwear much cleaner. He wondered if Nina had done as he did, standing under the shower in his underwear for a second, and then removing it and scrubbing it with liquid soap. He tried to ignore the visual, pleasant or otherwise, of Nina standing under the shower, soaking, removing her clothing. She rolled her shoulder blades. He wondered what her bare skin would look like when she did that.
Jack had to physically shake his head to get his mind back on track. He placed his trousers and shirt in the corner of the sink and used the loo, and then pulled his clothing on as quickly as he could. Jack pushed open the door to the bathroom and was greeted by the sight of Nina standing in the bedroom, pulling a shirt over her head, he didn't take in much of her apparel, just noting the top disappearing over the bottom of her breasts and the expanse of thigh, concealed from his view by only a tiny strip of green material. He shielded his eyes and quickly shut the bathroom door again.
Nina pulled the vest the rest of the way down her body and grabbed the gown she'd only just taken off. She put it back on, tying the sash around her waist, covering her modesty. She grabbed the door and pulled it open, revealing Jack standing there, with his hands on his hips.
"Sorry, I..."
Nina wasn't particularly bothered by him walking in on her, she was just desperate to get underway, back to their hotel. Jack broke off his apology as quickly as he started it, pushing past her into the main room. He started towards the bag.
"I'll pack everything up in here, you head back to the hotel, I've still got to dress." Nina watched as he surveyed the room. Eventually he gripped the door handle.
"I'll leave you with everything but the car keys, pay the bill, I'll probably get back in a half hour." Jack told her, she nodded slowly as she rummaged through the few items they had on the table, eventually tossing him the car keys. He caught them, and pulled open the door, heading out for his twenty minute walk up the road in the sun.
-24-
Nina fought off the urge to collapse on the bed when they finally got up to the hotel room. All she wanted to do was to lie face down on the large plush duvet cover, spread eagle and sleep for another five hours. She wasn't even tired, she just wanted the comfort. Jack dropped the sport bag on the chair by the door and she carried the hard drive to the bed.
She settled for perching on the end of the bed and unwrapping the hard drive. She placed it on the centre of the king sized bed, rolling the plastic bag up in her fingers. Jack came over, collecting his lap top from the bedside table. The laptop was almost completely empty, it only contained basic running software and few basic files, the registration codes on the programs had been stripped, removing any chance of tracing any of the software back to CTU. Jack inserted a yellow floppy disk into the machine and started it up, letting the computer know that any of the usual logs had to be recorded onto the floppy. Nina opened up the back of the computer, unraveling a short length of cord and fixing it into the back of the hard drive. The computer whirred into action after a short silence, and Jack was able to announce to Nina. "All the information is here, but the files are still encrypted."
"The Dramhurst key." Nina muttered. Jack exited the file manager and shut down the computer, disconnecting the hard drive, and removing the floppy disk. From now on the computer could not be run without the floppy disk.
"Which we know Carlos Batilla can lead us to." Jack muttered. This was the part of the plan that neither of them liked. Carlos Batilla was a Spanish military officer, a General. His name had been decoded in reference with several Basque separist groups, ETA among them, but nobody could prove he was dirty to the extent that the Spanish Military court requested them to.
Nina nodded. "We going to start tonight?" She asked, having let out a short sigh.
Jack glanced up at her, taking in the brief withering look that flitted across her face. "We'd better." He responded. He watched her stand up and walk a short circle, she tapped her thighs and closed her eyes. "We don't have to, if you're feeling..."
"No, no." She responded, "It's okay, we start tonight." She wandered off, and Jack heard the bathroom door click shut.
-24-